Prompt: Tell us about RDJ's childhood
[oops this went from childhood to why Ryan is the way he is now
He grew up like a pretty normal kid. His parents worked at the San Diego Zoo for most of his life (his mother a vet and his father a trainer), and because of that, he knows animals like the back of his hand. That came in handy when he found out that he could literally turn into any combination of animals he saw. At sixteen, he had mastered the basics of his ability.
While his dad wanted to know more about his abilities, his mom was different. She was only ever indifferent, or worried about him being able to shift. What if he got stuck in an exhibit because he was playing with the animals? What if someone found out and tried to experiment on him?
As a compromise to this mild war between his parents, he was only allowed to shift during closing hours and when they were alone in their living area in the back of the zoo. He was perfectly okay with this though, because he was making both of his parents (who he loved very much) happy, and he was getting to do something that he loved (playing with the animals and learning more about them every day).
He was home schooled, so he had little to no interaction with kids his age unless it was with little kids on field trips to the zoo. Growing up, he had two best friends though, and they ended up getting jobs at the zoo so that they could hang out more. He fell in deep liking with Nancy, his best friend that was a girl, but a few years later he found out that she was fucking his best bro, Tommy. That's the main reason he says love is stupid nowadays, because he hasn't gotten over that betrayal.
His mom died when he was 18, and he didn't know what to do. He'd literally spent his entire life with his parents, sheltered really, with no intentions of ever leaving them. He moved to NYC with his dad, and figured that the regular and sometimes out there tests his dad was doing with/on him were normal, at this point. He loved his dad, and didn't want to disrespect (because that was a huge no no in the Jared family) him, so he went along with everything, ranging from endurance tests, to speed tests, to anything else his dad could come up with.
There was one night that would forever change both of their lives, though. His dad made some sort of mix of drug cocktail and slipped it into Ryan's food. That was the night he killed two men. This event was the biggest change in his past.
It made him go from this boyish and fun loving sheltered kid, to the asshole with too much baggage and not enough control. He spent three years in solitary confinement before coming to TSI, and during those three years, his brain oh so helpfully supplied images and sounds from That Night, and though they were all fabricated, and he knows this fact, they still haunt him sometimes.
The one constant Ryan's always had in his life is having only a little bit of control over himself. When under extreme emotions, stress, or under the influence of drugs/alcohol, his more animalistic nature comes to the forefront, and he's more likely to be forced into a change.
Since coming to TSI, Ryan has gained a lot of control, thanks to his mentor and to his most likely long term lover, Lydia. He's no where near perfect now, but he's also not on such a hairpin trigger.
